


More Fire Than the Sun

by Kagutsuchi



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Adventure, Angst, Ensemble Cast, F/M, Friendship, POV Third Person Limited, Revolution, Romance, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-29
Packaged: 2018-05-21 11:52:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6050620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kagutsuchi/pseuds/Kagutsuchi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Etta Hawke lives hand to mouth and day to day, a maleficar for whom the betters of Kirkwall bear little love. It will take blood and time for her City of Chains to realize that such a one as she was made for more than the gutter. Such a one as she was made to rise and rise again. A retelling of Hawke's rise to power from shifting perspectives with an ensemble cast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Die is Cast

Wrist, neck, upper arm, none beat with any conviction. For a moment, his skin crawled and flickered blue. There was no pulse, and even his healing magic no longer ran clear - the impurity of malice tainted even that.

“Patients,” he called them. They would be little more than the dog-lord dead meat the Marchers took them for if things went on like this. 

 _The breath on the wick is not yours_ , Justice reminded him. Anders tried not to think about how life beyond the Veil was corroding his friend, just as surely as this City of Chains was grinding his own convictions down finer than any lyrium sand.  _Only a single grain is needed to slip the neck of the hourglass and draw the hour near. But who holds the glass?_

The boy’s heart stuttered, then leapt and bound like a rabbit out of a foxhole. Anders doubled over from the effort and the relief only to feel his skin stippled with blue once more. The boy’s father steadied him and probably thanked him but he could not hear him over the blood pounding in his ears. Vaguely, he perceived the approach of several imposing individuals, all of whom were armed.

“Stop! I have made this place a sanctum of healing and salvation! Why do you threaten it?”

The woman, equipped with a keen-edged halberd, stepped forward. “I looked for the lit lantern, healer. I see I was not lead astray.” She had a peculiar look about her, of partial Rivaini descent maybe - swarthy-skinned and silver-haired, with eyes the color of burnished gold. Like the Kirkwall Chantry’s Andraste Exultant come to life. 

“Another delicate mage flower? Figures.” This one was likely her brother, with the same high cheekbones and dark complexion. He made no secret of his mistrust as he stepped toward her with his hand on the hilt of the broad-edged greatsword that ran the full length of his back.

She touched his arm gently and he flinched, but the tension in his huge shoulders relaxed. “Carver, please. The Deep Roads won’t map themselves.”

“That’s my girl. Always getting straight to the point.” The dwarf to her side was far less jumpy and eyed him in a way that seemed friendly enough, though the wicked crossbow over his shoulder was anything but. 

Anders scowled. “If you’re here on Grey Warden business, you’d best leave now. I didn’t sail all the way to Kirkwall only to be dragged underneath it.”

“Ser, I’m well aware that you’re a Warden no longer and your business in Kirkwall is your own. I’m here about  _my_  business.”

 _Ser_. He almost laughed aloud. No one had called him that in his entire life. “Oh? And what business might that be? Speak quickly, I’ve patients waiting.”

“Of course. My associate, Varric Tethras, and I have set out to finance an exploratory expedition into the Deep Roads. We’ve no knowledge of nearby entrances however, and were hoping you might help us with that. It’s a fair-minded request, is it not?”

He considered this. The hour was late, and it was worth risking being ratted out to the Templars if it meant enlisting capable help. “If you’re a fair-minded lot”  - he paused to give the brother a significant look - “then you’ll agree that one good turn deserves another. I do have a map, and you shall have it, if you’ll come with me tonight. I’m here in Kirkwall for a friend - a mage. I mean to save him from the Gallows. But I cannot do so alone.” The brother glowered silently, but the dwarf remained impassive and the woman seemed merely attentive.

“I’d been exchanging letters with him via maidservant, but the templars must’ve found us out, because his letters stopped coming. I fear the worst…I must go to him tonight.”

“Do you mean to make him an apostate, like yourself?” Her tone was careful and even, but still he could feel his hackles rise. 

“Andraste said magic should serve man, not rule him, but I’ve yet to find a mage who wanted to rule anything. It goes against no rule of the Maker for mages to live as free as other men.”

“Forcing mages into servitude is not the way to prevent the rise of another Imperium.”

It was said without hesitation and with a readiness that suggested total sincerity. “That’s…not usually the response I get.”

“Small wonder, that,” scoffed the brother.

“It’s a deal, then?” She took his hand with callused fingers and shook it firmly. Familiar calluses.

“Deal.”

“Then meet me at midnight in the Chantry, beneath Andraste Exultant. And come prepared for a fight. You may call me Anders, Messere…?”

“Just Hawke, thank you kindly. Marietta Hawke at your service. With her surly brother Carver and best mate Varric Tethras in tow.” The brother rolled his eyes at that and the dwarf smiled. They melted into the soot-laden gloom of the Darktown corridor beyond his clinic, but she lingered behind.

“I just wanted to say that what you’re doing for these people…healing their hurts, delivering their children, easing their passage to the Maker’s side - that is the greatest protest against the demon-ridden maleficar the Chantry would make us out to be.”

“’Us?’”

“Yes.” She grinned as in the palm of her hand a ball of flame flickered into life. “I am not so fortunate as yourself. My magic’s no good for healing. But I fully intend to use it to protect you and your friend in the Chantry tonight. Any templar who might cross you will spend their final moments bathed in Andraste’s eternal flame.” 

So that’s where the calluses came from. Her face, with its wicked grin, was a thing of frightful beauty lit by light of her own making in this place of creeping darkness. He returned her smirk with one of his own.

“A fitting end, though it is perhaps more than they deserve.”

“Poetry over penance, I always say.” He laughed for the first time in too long a while.

Now she, too, receded into darkness, her flame out so quickly he wondered if she’d ever really been there. He’d had some blackouts lately, but he’d never hallucinated, so she must’ve been real.

* * *

“What the hell were you thinking?” Carver’s grip on the tarnished silverite doorknob outside Gamlen’s garret was such that against all logic, Marietta Hawke feared he’d crush it. It was one of many articles their uncle had “reclaimed” from the old Amell estate.

“Careful, brother, that’s the most expensive piece of the house you’ve got there in your meaty hands.” She nudged him gently aside and jiggered it open with a graceful gesture that just made Carver more annoyed.

“Always with the deflecting! Etta, this is serious. You can’t swing a dead cat around here without hitting a templar, and you want to go running right into their arms? Have all the years of your life on the run - all the years of my life - taught you nothing?” They sat around Gamlen’s rickety card table, Hawke idly shuffling the cards in preparation for their evening game of Wicked Grace until the daggers Caver glared at her proved too deadly to ignore. 

“As if you’d let me go with you anyhow! You’ve always got to be playing the hero and lording it over your little brother like you’re the Queen of Ferelden-”

“That’s enough,” she snapped. “You know very well that the only person who wants you out of my shadow more than you is me and it’s mother who doesn’t want you going. I’ll not stop you. I didn’t ask to be the one holding this family together but how could I avoid it when Mother’s every word to me is weighted with the kind of gentle resentment only she can bear so gracefully? I didn’t ask to be the eldest, I didn’t ask to be a mage, and I certainly didn’t ask you to set up camp and brood in the shadow of my abilities, but I am, and you did.”

Carver fell silent, his expression hard and unreadable as it so often was these days. She put a hand on his.

“We’re more alike than you think,” she said. “I know you can’t abide an injustice, and I can’t abide this one. I can’t ignore a fellow mage in need, and we need those maps.” He groaned and rolled his eyes but for once, he didn’t push her hand away.

“One day, you’re going to get us both killed.”

“Both?” Hawke grinned.

“Of course. I’m with you, like it or no,” he replied, expressionless, but there was a smile in his eyes. He tossed her the card deck. “But first, let’s see how much more money you can cheat me out of.”

“Wouldn’t be a real afternoon if I didn’t.”

* * *

She arrived precisely on time, emerging from the shadows of the Chantry courtyard as quiet as you please, her golden eyes as hungry and intent as those of the cats he watched prowling the abandoned mining tunnels of Darktown. He was surprised to see that her brother was there too, as was the dwarf.

“Are you ready?” he whispered. “Were you seen?”

“Not that I could tell,” Varric replied, “and believe me, I can tell.”

“Very well then. I will go to Karl while you keep an eye out for templars.”

“I’ll do you one better, Blondie. I’ll throw the second eye in free of charge.” Anders smiled. He was going to like this guy.

Hawke walked toward the Chantry’s towering gilt doors. “We’re ready.”

They entered, the huge golden hinges making no sound and their footfalls echoing only faintly. It was said that the magister who used to sit in state here had enchanted it to be nearly silent, for his own peace of mind.

The red velvet carpeting of the steps leading up to the second level swam before Anders’ eyes. He had been getting more dizzy spells like this lately, usually when he was tense or anxious. It was troubling. He reached for the bannister to steady himself.

“Are you alright?” Her voice cut to the quick of his consciousness like a knife.

He stood up straight. “I will be. Let’s get this over with.”

On the second level, they turned a corner and there he was - the back of him anyhow. There was more grey in his hair maybe, but he still stood as strong and tall as Anders remembered him.

“Karl, it’s me.” But he wouldn’t turn.

“Anders, I know you too well. I knew you would never give up.” Karl’s voice had always had a certain mellifluous quality to it that Anders had never tired of hearing. But it was flat and toneless now and that could mean only one thing.  _Oh Maker, not that. Anything but that._

“What’s wrong? Why are you talking like-”

He turned, the rusty orange brand of Tranquility a stark contrast to his fair skin. He could barely hear Karl’s monotone above the rush of blood in his ears. “I was too rebellious, like you,” Karl said carefully. “The Templars knew I had to be made an example of.”

“No…” The dizziness was back, along with something thick and bilious in the back of his throat. Karl’s droning continued. 

“How else will mages ever master themselves? You’ll understand, Anders. As soon as the Templars teach you to control yourself.”

His skin flickered and crackled blue. The last thing he saw was Hawke’s halberd, in reality a dark wooden stave tipped with a dull orange orb she drew from her trousers and locked into place, a cruel blade at its base. Fire sprung into life at her fingertips just as everything else went dark.

“Anders, what did you do?” The first thing he heard was Karl’s voice, his real voice. “It’s like you brought a piece of the Fade into this world. I had already forgotten what that feels like.” Anders fully came to, head aching and fingers tingling. The others watched them in silence. Hawke and Carver were covered in blood, but the dwarf bowman was nearly spotless. He’d tend to all of them later.

“It’s like a gateway to the Fade inside you, shining like the sun.”

He tried speaking, though his throat was raw and his mind reeling, but he managed it. “I have some…unique circumstances, yes. But more importantly, Karl, what’s happened to you?”

“The Templars here are far more vigilant than in Ferelden. They found a letter I was writing you. You cannot imagine it, Anders. All the color, all the music in the world, gone. I would gladly give up my magic, but this - I’ll never be whole again. Please, kill me before I forget again! I don’t know how you brought it back but it’s fading!”

“Karl, no…” Hawke moved across the room towards the two of them.

“There’s no need for that.” Her eyes were glassy in the luminous cast of the Chantry’s many candles. “Perhaps we can find a cure.”

“Can you cure a beheading?” he replied more harshly than he’d intended. “No, the minds of Tranquil mages are forever sundered from the Fade. They will never dream or feel again.”

“Please, Anders.” Already his voice sounded more distant, the look in his dark eyes more remote. “It’s fading already. Be swift and sure.”

“Help him.” Hawke’s voice was barely above a whisper. Karl blinked slowly and the others looked on in silence, the set of Carver’s jaw as sharp and stiff as the blade on his back.

“Why do you look at me like that?” Karl was gone. He could not kill what was already dead. Anders drew a dagger from within his cloak.

“I was too late. I’m sorry, Karl.” He was swift and sure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're wondering what Etta looks like, here she is with her Act 1 haircut (she grows it out later) in the Robes of the Pretender with the Staff of Parthalan - with an obligatory Anders in the background ofc. http://bens0lo.co.vu/private/139549053961/tumblr_o2r5vzUuaO1s5ll9v


	2. Tethered

Some weeks passed before Hawke paid a visit to the clinic again. She couldn’t just show up immediately demanding the maps - to do so would be heartless in light of what had happened. But she finally made her way back to the dark alley lit softly by paper lamplight.

The doors were open wide, not advisable in a place like Darktown. She was beginning to think nothing this man did was advisable. It was rather large on the inside, for Darktown patients in various stages of recovery lay on stretchers on the carefully packed and swept dirt floor. There was no sign of Anders. She made her way to the back of the room, to the door she assumed opened on his private quarters, and knocked.

“If this is about that new disease making the rounds at the Blooming Rose, for the umpteenth time, I can’t treat it. I’m all out of salve. Come back next week.”

“It’s Hawke.” There was a pause, some indecisive shuffling, and the door swung open. He was more haggard than the last time she’d seen him, his cheeks slightly sunken and his aquiline nose standing out all the more in contrast.

“I thought I’d check in…Please excuse my intrusion.” 

He stared at her intently. “No, not at all. You’ll be wanting the maps of course.” He gestured to a spindly wooden chair in the corner of his bedroom - it was little more than a barracks, with only a cot, a chair, and a desk covered in stacks of parchment. No windows of course, as there wasn’t much pleasant to look at in Darktown.

“That’s part of why I’m here, yes.” He rifled through the drawers of his desk with his back to her. “But I also wanted to check on you. What happened with Karl…” His back stiffened but he didn’t turn around. “…it was a great injustice. I’m sorry it had to end that way.” He handed her the maps as he turned to face her.

“Yes…” His eyes were bright and sharp and searching even in the dim light emanating from the stub of a candle on his desk. “It never should’ve happened. Never should’ve been possible.”

“I hope you don’t blame yourself.”

“Not at all. I think we both know who’s to blame.” Out of habit, Hawke glanced from side to side before responding and nodded.

“All too well.” He was studying her carefully and she shifted uncomfortably beneath his gaze and turned to go. 

“I’ll be going then. Good luck with your endeavors and stay safe. You’re the last best hope for so many of these people.” She’d only walked across a few feet of planking to reach the door when he stopped her. 

“Wait, I…I think I owe you an explanation.” She’d wondered if he’d speak on the matter.

“You don’t owe me anything. You’re a spirit healer, right? Father spoke of them to me once, though he was no healer. It’s just what Karl said, isn’t it? A…a bit of the Fade leaked through you. You were angry and the spirits you call upon responded to that. You needn’t tell me more.” She lingered in the doorway, hoping he’d let it end at that. She knew little of the Fade, just enough to defend herself from possession. Her time there had been brief - she’d gone through a supervised, simulated Harrowing of sorts and faced down a desire demon, her father at her side all the while. But his teachings and her studies had rarely gone beyond the practical. There had simply been no time. And there was no time now. She was wanted at home, and she had a job tonight. Athenril didn’t like to be kept waiting. 

He looked at her askance. Unsurprising, considering that the response he usually got was likely a far cry less dismissive. She turned to go and was halfway to the clinic door when she sighed and turned around and headed back to his room. _You don’t just rely on the kindness of strangers, you hand it out like candy._ Carver couldn’t be more right.

“On second thought, I would hear more of this spirit.” She simply couldn’t ignore a silent plea in the eyes - and such eyes they were. They burned like coals in the guttering candlelight, and she’d never been able to let a dying fire go out. She only ever fed it or smothered it herself.

“You…you would?” He offered her his chair and closed the door behind her. “Very well then. It’s not what you think. Or what most think. Or perhaps not even what I think, but it…is what it is.” He ran his fingers through his hair and fiddled with the metal fastenings on his cloak as he spoke. “In my travels, I met a free Fade spirit. A spirit of Justice. He aided me and my companions and we became friends. But he wasn’t long for this world - his host, the corpse of a dead Grey Warden - was rotting away. He proposed that I allow him to inhabit my body, and together, we’d strive to further the cause of mages. But my anger was too much for him. When he resurfaces, he’s no longer a force for justice, but a thirst for vengeance, and it took some getting used to. But most of the time, I can keep him in check.” He stared fixedly at the patch of wall just to the side of her head, as if facing her reaction head on would be too much for him.

“I know precious little of spirits, and you seem a decent sort. Saintly, even, if everything Lirene tells me is true and it has been thus far. But spirits…my father used to say they could only be one thing or the other. There’s not room in them for more than any given idea and its various iterations. Perhaps that would explain your condition?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. Not even the greatest scholar could tell you where I end and he begins.”

It was a disturbing thought and she let it rest between them before she continued.

“Surely there’s a way you might be separated…”

“None of which I’m aware. And I’ve gone to every length to find one, believe me. I fear that in the end…I’m a danger to all I meet. So I stay here and hope the refugees trust me enough not to inform the Templars of my existence.” 

He cast his eyes over her once again, pleading her not to…what? Cast him aside? Strike him down? As usual, such a plea made her go to the other extreme.

“You are a Spirit Healer, a strong one if the health of those refugees is anything to attest to. If you cannot part with this spirit, perhaps you can learn to live with it.”

His lips twitched briefly upwards in a wan smile, but he did not respond. She looked around his room again - windowless and dark, bearing no mark of the person who lived there.

“You need an anchor. You need something to tie you to this world so that you don’t fear you’ll desert it for the next. These people you help move in and out of your life - they are footholds but no permanent tether.”

He met her eyes directly again and the plea remained.

“You are asking me to build a life without a foundation.”

“Then perhaps you need the next best thing - a distraction.”

\--------------------------------------

Anders blinked in the last red rays of the setting sun. It had been at least a month since he’d been aboveground in daylight. She’d lured him to the surface easily with her open compassion and the disarming way she kept shepherding him from one level of Darktown to the next, as if he could not find the way himself.

“You’re sure you’re okay with this? My brother Carver frowns on any and all criminal activity since we bought our freedom from Athenril.”

He scoffed at that. “It’s foolish for him to turn down his nose at it. It’s nigh impossible to get a decent job in this city as a Fereldan, and it’s even riskier if you’re an apostate. Stealing from the rich has never been something I’ve frowned at, if the need is real.”

She cuffed him lightly on the shoulder. “You see, that’s what _I_ say! And every time he acts as if he’s above it, the numbskull.”

The docks were black and scarlet in the evening sun, and the Gallows looked dark and forbidding above it all. But its shadow did not reach the pale stone of the Western Warehouse District. Only her shadow cut a figure across it, thin as a whippet and black as the day had been long. When she laughed, her cheeks seemed less hollow. The sleeveless padded green vest she wore concealed how thin and frail she was underneath while accentuating the wiry strength of her arms, coiled with muscle laid tight against the bone as sailor’s rope. She seemed as at home here as anyone ever could be, and he marvelled at it.

They met the dwarf at the end of the pier alongside a vaguely familiar Rivaini with a smile like a knife, a pair of cruel blades strapped to her waist and a life’s worth of gold hung round her neck. She laughed at the sight of them.

“If there’s one thing you’re good at, Hawke, it’s picking up strays. For a long time I’d thought you less of a hand at sorting the reliable from the treacherous, but this one makes up for all of your failings.” She grinned. “Whether he’s reliable _or_ treacherous.”

“Blunt as the edge of my dagger, as usual,” Hawke replied, laughing. “Be gentle with this one, Isa, I’d like to keep him around.”

“Every blade needs a whetstone but I’ll sharpen mine elsewhere, not to worry. That’s where the city got its name, isn’t it? The incredibly hard stones everywhere?”

“Maker bless your metaphors, Isabela,” said Varric. “But we can discuss the finer points of blades and whetstones later. Athenril’s contact should be making the drop at the edge of the Western Warehouse District anytime now.”

Hawke nodded. “Keep your eyes peeled and your wits sharp. Athenril’s been trying to corner the lyrium smuggling market in Kirkwall for some time now, even though we all know that’s Coterie business. As far as I am aware, Pryce should be picking up some expensive curios and the pay to go with them tonight - no lyrium - but that doesn’t mean the Coterie won’t show up to prove a point.”

Isabela ran a slender finger down the length of one of her daggers. “I say let them come. I’ve no love for those harpies, and a little bloodletting never hurt anyone. With the exception of those on the end of my blade.”

Varric chuckled and unholstered his bow, a wicked mechanism the likes of which Anders had never seen. “A sentiment they’d find all too familiar, I’ll bet.”

Hawke expertly flicked the dagger from Isabela’s hand with the blade on the end of her staff, catching it mid-air. “I hate the Coterie as much as the next poor sod in the smuggling game but no showboating tonight, Isabela. In and out, faster than they come...and go at the Blooming Rose. That’s the plan.”

Isabela raised her eyebrows, impressed. “You’ve been practicing. I’m a better teacher than I thought.”

Hawke grinned. “The best. So far as knives and dirty metaphors go.”

“And what about you, sweet thing. Can the penniless healer fend for himself?” Isabela reached for her dagger when Hawke tossed it her way and Anders sheathed it in ice quicker than she could catch it.

“I used to be a Grey Warden and I’ve kept templars at bay for most of my life. I might come in handy. In a pinch.”

“I’d like to see that,” Isabela purred. Hawke rolled her eyes.

“I daresay you would, but we have to go.”

\--------------------------------------

It was a tidy little outfit they had going, running tight and fast. He’d only ever been to the docks for a few emergency cases - usually dockhands who’d been gravely injured on the job - but Anders felt safe among these people, even at this late hour in the most dangerous quarter of the city. It reminded him of the times he’d actually enjoyed being a Warden, as much as one ever could, alongside his fellow Circle mage turned Warden, the Warden-Commander Surana.

Hawke’s crew combed the side alleys and the deserted quays for any suspect activity, never too far apart that they couldn’t signal each other. Anders fit into their operation with relative ease, having had some experience with reconnoissance during his days serving Surana. The docks were quiet, unnaturally so, and that could only mean one thing.

“Something big is going down tonight, or is supposed to,” Hawke whispered to them when the five of them reconvened near the shuttered Qunari compound. “Athenril’s hunch was right. Be on your guard. I’ll take point with Isa. Varric, hang back in the shadows of the Harbormaster’s compound with our healer.” She smiled at him and he returned the gesture.

Varric laughed. “If Carver were here he’d be yelling at you for taking point again.”

Hawke carefully screwed the power orb onto the end of her staff and scoffed. “Carver and his ‘delicate mage flower’ nonsense. I can take a few hits, if any of them even manage to get close to me. I have ways of keeping them well at bay, as he knows.” She cracked her knuckles, rolled her shoulders, and smirked. “But Carver’s not here.”

Isabela rounded the corner, panting. “Athenril’s contact is a little boy. I didn’t think she’d stoop to using children but a good thief is hard to find these days when most work for the Coterie and all that’s left are refugees, the lot of them green at best. He’s in the center of the quay with a big wooden chest, setting up a dead drop. Or to drop dead, if the Coterie gets what they want.”

“Lead the way, Isa. I have your back and the others will follow directly.” She nodded and the two of them made their way quayside. The boy started at their approach, but wouldn’t leave the merchandise. He feared the consequences of losing it more than the intentions of the approaching strangers.

Anders couldn’t make out what Hawke whispered to him, but he seemed to let his guard down a bit. That was when an arrow nearly connected with her head, deflected by Isabela’s serrated blades just in time. The Coterie’s men seemed to be everywhere at once, descending from rooftops and rising from the sewer passages of the Undercity, steaming with chokedamp. It was not so different from a Darkspawn horde, which did not give Anders pause in good, competent company.

Hawke drew the boy to her side and kept him close in the crook of her arm as she set her assailants alight and expelled dark pulses of spirit energy from her fingertips. Isabela thinned the field impressively, slicing through leather armor like cheesecloth, until the enemy’s numbers were low enough for Varric and himself to advance. Now was his chance to make himself useful. He froze an oncoming Coterie thug in a jagged cone of ice and Hawke whooped.

“Well struck! An ice mage, eh? You’re Varric’s new best friend. Light ‘em up!” The unfortunate soul Anders had recently coated in ice blew to pieces after Varric’s quarrel lodged itself squarely in his heart and exploded. A bloody business, this. The boy, Pryce, watched it all with eyes like saucers, but he was Fereldan, Hawke had told Anders. He had seen worse and it was no doubt what had led him to this city, though most would argue it had seen no better.

As Hawke shook off her pursuers with nimble fingers darting jagged bolts of blue and purple into the midst of any oncoming foes, something strange happened to him. Another dizzy spell, this one not brought on by negative emotions. If anything, he felt more alive right now than he had in years, fighting the dregs of Kirkwall society (such as it was) alongside like-minded individuals. A pang of fear roiled in his gut. Could Justice be taking control, even now, when he was more or less at peace? A sudden keening filled his ears and he muffled a cry of pain, but it quickly resolved itself into what was unmistakeable music - a flurry of silvery notes gracelessly phrased at first, then measured and lilting in great, vaulting arcs of sound. It was the sound of her magic. Justice had often said that lyrium sung to him and that people themselves, mages in particular, had a distinct sound to them. _Only a few have ever sung a song to me in full_ , he told Anders now. _She is special. She draws on the Fade as orichalcum is drawn, as water from a pool - with neither fear nor insolence._ Anders slowed his breathing to find his center again, steadying himself against his staff. Varric looked at him sidelong but said nothing when he righted himself and set about icing the enemy once more.

The operation proceeded smoothly until a few Coterie assassins entered the mix in a flurry of smoke and stunning powders. Anders left combat to the others and drew on his deep reserves of healing energy to keep them going, but they were all beginning to flag and he was running out of magical energy. That was when Hawke drew a blade across the palm of her left hand.

Suddenly, her staff surged with heat and a ball of flame burst from the orb at its tip. She struck down the remainder of their enemies with a hissing beam of spirit energy, suffusing one man’s quivering fame with pulsing blue light until he burst and took the rest down with him. A powerful spirit bomb, cast when he knew her energy was too low to support complex spells just minutes prior. It could only be blood magic.

His immediate response would normally have been anger and suspicion, but he found it impossible to conjure up even the semblance of indignation, because, as Justice now told him, _The song is the same. She still draws on the power of the Fade, more quickly perhaps, but with no less respect, and no more than she needs. You did the same once, but your song was too strident, too heedless of form, too lacking in function. Hers tells only of needful things._ It normally irked him to no end when Justice casually recounted his shortcomings as a vessel, but he was too captivated by the sound of her to think of much else. And so the battle ended.

“Are you all right?” She wiped the blood from her palm carefully with a stained handkerchief clearly used for this purpose before and placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder, gently. “There aren’t any more are there, Varric? Isabela?”

“The coast’s clear,” Varric reassured her. “Not a toadie in sight.”

“How old are you, Pryce? This is no life for a bright young lad like yourself.” Her hand lingered on his shoulder and he stared at it overlong before looking up.

“My father...died defending our land, back in Ferelden. My mother was killed by darkspawn. How else am I to raise my sisters?”

“Easy.” She kicked the chest he’d been guarding so vigilantly, abandoned now in the reassuring presence of her hand on his shoulder. “It’s all there, isn’t it? And it’s yours.”

Isabela tutted and put her hands on her hips. “Didn’t you take this job because you need the money?”

Hawke’s mouth was a firm, thin line. “Athenril might have no problem with using a child to advance her fortune, but I do. I’m sorry, Isa. If it helps, I’ve some silver squirreled away at home that will make up your anticipated share.”

Isabela sighed and laughed at once, a breezy sound notably lacking in bitterness. “I don’t expect my friends to pay me for a night out on the town, do I? I’m no working girl, no matter what anyone might say on the subject. Athenril, on the other hand...what do you intend to do about her? She’ll be wanting Pryce to pay up.”

“I’ll lie of course. Say that he and the dead drop were long empty when I arrived. She can hardly expect a gaggle of little boys to be the most efficient or effective assets she has in the field.”

“True enough. Well then, let’s get home. By which I mean The Hanged Man, of course. Not to rule out the possibility of The Blooming Rose later.”

“For you, maybe. What is your lease there, their finest suite every night for a year? Crime does pay. Me, I’m too tired to look for love in all the wrong places.” Pryce looked at Hawke expectantly and she tousled his hair. She winced almost imperceptibly. Her hand pained her, Anders could see. “Take that money and buy passage back to Ferelden. There’s honest work herding sheep and waiting table at a lord’s house, for yourself and your sisters. Make your way to Redcliffe - the bannorn’s mostly recovered there. Speak with Arl Teagan and he will find a place for you. I will walk you home.” The boy nodded sheepishly.

Varric and Isabela started to leave, but Anders lingered behind, running long fingers through his hair. “You’re welcome to come along, blondie,” Varric said. “Great job out there, by the way. We made a good freeze-and-obliterate team. I’d clap you on the shoulder but you’re just too damn tall.”

Anders raised an incredulous brow. “You’re sure you won’t mind being seen with me? A rebel Warden apostate?”

Varric laughed. “I have ways of making the ones in charge look the other way when it suits me. Let’s put it this way - you’re probably safer drinking Lowtown swill in a tavern with me surrounded by a whole company of templars than you are alone in the sewers.”

“Well, if you’re sure...” He cleared his throat and turned to Marietta. “Hawke, if I may...your hand is injured.”

Her brows furrowed. “Let’s worry about that later. I’ll see you at the Hanged Man.” With Pryce behind her, she headed further down the quay, leaving Anders at a loss.

\--------------------------------------

The Hanged Man reeked of sour ale, but it was warm and dry. Warmer and drier than its patrons, anyhow, Anders included. He’d sat in silence at first, let Varric buy him a drink because he had no coin on him (and precious little at home, in truth). He decided not to tell his compatriots that because of Justice, he could never become inebriated again. In the midst of a game of Wicked Grace that he was decidedly losing (though Isabela had graciously declined his offer to bet future spoils) Hawke arrived, enormous mabari hound in tow.

“There’s my fine Fereldan gentleman, out on his nightly walk on the town!” Isabela leapt up to muss the mabari’s ears. “Perhaps a prince in name only, but regal nonetheless.”

Hawke already had a pint in hand. “A toast to the Prince of Lowtown. All the royalty that ever dwelled here, and all that ever shall.” She downed it in one go and wiped her mouth with the heel of her palm. “Really, though. He’s the one mabari allowed in here and that’s only thanks to Varric elbowing Corff into indulging my Fereldan whims.”

“Another?” Isabela asked. Hawke sighed.

“Not tonight, I’m afraid. Corff’s watered me down enough for now. I envy your stamina.” Isabela shrugged.

“Suit yourself. I expect you on top form next time.” Hawke smiled, but her eyes were dull with fatigue.

“I’ll be by the fire with Prince if you all need me.” His game with Isabela done, Anders made his way through the mess of rickety tables and overturned chairs to join her by the surprisingly cheery hearth.

The mabari nudged his palm with its wet nose and he laughed nervously as he sat opposite Hawke. He avoided dogs, as a rule. “So...Prince, is it? Who named him?”

“I did, years ago. Thought it ironic to make him royalty when his family was three fifths mage. Any line with that much magical blood would never make it at court.” Anders laughed and Hawke smiled at him again, that same disarming smile that had led him to leave his sewer hovel for the first time in a month.

“Three fifths?”

“Yes...Carver had a twin sister, a mage like me. And there was my father. Both dead now.”

“I’m...sorry.” Hawke smiled again, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

“Don’t be. I’m sorry enough for both of us and else besides. Anyhow, thanks for coming along. I think the fresh air did you some good, don’t you? As fresh as air gets in Kirkwall at any rate.”

“I believe you’re right. But about that...you don’t seem well.” He gestured at her hand. “Would you mind if I had a look?”

She narrowed her eyes. “If this is about my use of blood magic, you’d best keep it to yourself. I do what I can to get by and protect my family, like my father before me. He taught me enough to know the power of blood and its inherent danger. And demon-summoning isn’t my style, nor will it ever be. I use what I need of myself and no more.”

“And that’s clearly the issue here. You’re over-extending yourself and your body isn’t responding well to it. I’m a spirit healer, I can sense these things. So...if you please.” He extended a hand to her and she lay her hand in his with a begrudging sigh. Gently, he undid the makeshift cloth wrap she’d bound around it. Tendrils of pure white light leeched into the wound and she pulled her hand back in shock.

“Right here? Out in the open?” she hissed.

“It’s a simple enough spell, hardly noticeable. Would you rather we do it in the sewer?”

“Do _what_?” A very drunk Isabela hung over the back of Hawke’s chair. She squinted at Hawke’s withdrawn hand. “Was he healing that nasty wound of yours? Not to worry, it’ll just look as if you’re holding hands.” She gave Anders a once over. “Like I said before, Hawke, you know how to pick ‘em. Tall, blond, really nice frame under that ridiculous feathery overcoat, _and_ he can do that electricity thing.”

Hawke couldn’t suppress her laughter. “What electricity thing? Do you two know each other?”

“The Pearl in Denerim, you remember, don’t you, Anders? I ran into you in flagrante delicto with that one tattooed wench I was so fond of.”

“Ah, yes, the Lay Warden.” Anders smiled sheepishly at the realization. “I know she was yours for the night but she wasn’t occupied so I thought I’d have a go before the templars caught up.”

“And you’re still on my tab. How little has changed. I’ll leave you mages to mack on each other in peace.” She struggled up from her vantage point, draped precariously over the back of Hawke’s chair, and wandered off to another round. Marietta shook her head and rolled her eyes.

“Anyway...it’s fine, I suppose. Please continue.”

“Very well then.” He gently pushed back the leather gauntlet on her wrist to expose the skin beneath and found she had scars, some of them fairly superficial, some disturbingly deep, all down her arm. “This is all from...”

“Blood sacrifice, yes.” She shifted uncomfortably. “Nasty business but it gets the job done.”

“Next time you do this, let me know. I have salves that can prevent or mitigate scarring. Not that scars are bad, I’ve plenty myself, but just know it’s an option.” She nodded, mouth a firm line. Was it possible to have too much in common? It was so hard to know what to say to the first person you felt close to in many years, and so quickly. He closed his eyes and focused on healing her hurts. It’s what he’d always been best at, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Attempted to incorporate my interpretation of this beautiful headcanon (http://carabas.tumblr.com/post/137005149787/theres-this-banter-between-cole-and-dorian) by tumblr user carabas.


	3. A Thing You Choose

Marietta Hawke began each morning with a prayer. She kneeled at the side of her bed, bare knees scraping the sooty floor beneath her grey linen shift. Everything was grey and brown here; the entire Amell household (such as it was), was coated with a fine layer of soot that seeped in from the nearby foundry no matter what they did to keep it out, and all white articles of clothing slowly took on the grey cast of their duller brethren.

“Find me well within Your grace. Touch me with fire that I be cleansed...” To her, Transfigurations 12 had always been the most beautiful prayer in the Chant. It was asking without begging, a call to action as much as a plea for succor. “For You are the fire at the heart of the world, and comfort is only Yours to give.” Finishing, she pushed herself to her feet and found herself face to face with Carver’s semi-permanent glower.

“You know, you have a lot in common with the Maker, sister. Comfort is only yours to give, apparently, never to receive. What’s all this business with Athenril’s toddler flunkies I hear tell you got up to?” he mumbled from the top bunk. Hawke sighed and craned her neck to match his glower with a scowl of her own.

“What do you care if I made money off that venture or not? I thought such behavior was beneath you. And _how_ do you even know about it? I didn’t take you along for a reason, you know. You hate to be reminded that you were ever once indebted to anyone.”

“Isabela told me.”

“Isa and her big drunk mouth...When?”

“Last night at the...well...”

“Carver! Don’t tell me you’re visiting The Rose again! You can find a nice girl without blowing our hard-earned money!” She imagined she looked as ridiculous as she felt, yelling up at a full-grown man in her nightie, eyes still bleary and hair less than artfully askew.

“I didn’t spend any, I swear! That was one time and since then I’ve just gone to...watch,” he finished lamely, gaze downcast and ears red.

“To watch?” If her eyebrows could’ve risen any higher, they’d have flown off her head.

“Maker’s breath, not like that, Etta! Just to...you know...make eyes at people.” She felt her own eyes soften. A Kirkwaller could tell a Fereldan from a mile away by accent alone and that had certainly done Carver no favors since their arrival. Sometimes a simulacrum of affection was better than nothing.

“That’s...very sweet, Carver. I’ll not stop you there. It’s just that this expedition is so important and-”

“Yes, yes, alright already!” He climbed down the stairs and stood at his full height before her, less intimidating in his voluminous linen nightshirt than he perhaps intended to be. “Do you take me for a simpleton? I wouldn’t squander my share when for the first time in a year, we have something worth saving up for!”

“Fair enough. I’ve said my piece and will leave you be.” She reached for her chainmail and leathers and made to leave their bedroom. Carver tossed her stave across the room and she caught it without turning around.

“Planning on a fight today?” His back was turned but the upward hitch in his tone betrayed him.

“Want to come?”

“Depends. Is this a charity collection or are we keeping a few silvers for ourselves?” He was already lacing up his trousers, though, and slipping on his leather bracers.

“Profit will rule the day, I assure you.” She hefted his greatsword from its place against the wall, displacing a fine layer of soot that left her coughing and sneezing. He took it and grinned.

“You’ve gotten much stronger since we arrived here. I’m impressed. Were it not for your sparklefingers, you’dve made as good a swordsman as any. And we probably wouldn’t be living in this hole.”

“Alas for my sparklefingers! But here we are in fair Kirkwall, and I intend to put my magic fingers to work...just not in the way so many expected me to. They still ask if I’d like to work at the Blooming Rose. I’m not quite that desperate yet, no matter how good their Antivan Red is.”

* * *

Mother fussed over them before they left, as she always did - making sure that they’d packed their healing poultices and a lunch of hardtack and salted pork. Their breakfast consisted of Fereldan lamb and pea stew. Little lamb or peas, and mostly stew, but sustenance enough. Hawke kissed her mother’s forehead before she left and saluted Gamlen’s grumbling silhouette in the back room. She whistled for Prince and the mabari was at her side immediately.

The docks were abuzz with activity this early in the morning. The warehouses and shipping offices acted as conduits to an endless stream of merchants and soldiers of fortune from the world over, bringing with them news of distant conflict in Tevinter and Par Vollen to the North, and the tangy salt smell of the sea. It was that magical time of day when smoke from the foundries hadn’t made its way down from Lowtown yet, so you could still see the sky and sun and breathe clean air off the ocean. Hawke took a deep breath.

“Smell that, brother?”

Carver frowned. “What, bilge water?”

“No, brine and fresh air and opportunity!” She ran ahead and down to the docks where their small sailing skiff waited. Not a craft meant for open waters, but sufficient for fishing and sailing along the coast as they were meant to do today. Varric looked up from his crossbow, Bianca lying atop a crate as he oiled her mechanisms. Anders sat at the foot of the limestone steps leading into the harbor waters below, seawater lapping gently at his boots. He turned at her approach. There were dark circles under his eyes but his smile was genuine. She squeezed his shoulder.

“Ever been on the open sea?” she asked him.

Carver scoffed. “This piece of junk can’t leave the shore without getting blown to pieces in the bay. Open sea my arse. Besides, he’s a refugee like us, he’ll have been on the sea before.”

“He’s Fereldan, remember? We weren’t even allowed out of the hold until we’d made land. It’s one thing to travel seasick in the belly of a shipping brig sitting in your own sweat for a fortnight. It’s another to skim the shoreline in a flat-bottomed sailboat just ahead of the wind’s edge while the air’s still clear.” Varric whistled.

“Better stop talking like that, Hawke. You’re gonna put me out of business! Maybe I should look into writing swashbucklers, see if I can out-romanticize your Kirkwall harbor description.”

Hawke readied the sails and settled herself at the oars, Prince nestling into the bow of the ship where the wind could blow on his face. “Not romance if it’s true. The sound of the sea, the wind in your hair - you’ve lived here most of your life, Varric. You can’t tell me it hasn’t grown on you, even a little?”

“Pffft. Like a tumor, maybe.”

Carver pushed her aside to take the oars himself. “What’s changed since last we sailed? Decided that the strapping young man with the big, beefy arms should maybe give his sister a break?”

Carver’s ears turned red but he didn’t say anything. “If you like, we can take turns,” Anders offered. “That way Hawke can navigate and Varric is free to dry heave over the stern as much as he needs to.” Carver ignored him, staring dead ahead at the foggy expanse of the Wounded Coast that stretched out like a shroud over the horizon.

“Don’t worry, Blondie, he’s always like this. Every time Waffles here brings a male friend along he’s gotta puff his chest out and have either the last word or play the strong, silent card. Good thing he’s opted for mute and surly today or you might actually have to talk to him.” Carver opened his mouth wide at that but ultimately thought better of taking on a grumpy, almost certainly already seasick Varric.

Hawke looked up from the navigation chart spread across her lap as Carver rowed them out of the harbor. “Waffles? Is that the best you can do, Varric?”

“You’ve always got to court a notion nice and proper before you’ll take it to bed with you. Opportunity may only knock once, kid, but you aren’t afraid to lead it on.”

“What can I say? I play the field and I don’t take chances.”

“Unless Chances is wearing a feathery overcoat,” mumbled Carver. Hawke punched him in the arm.

* * *

They picked their way along the coast - out of the harbor and down the long white shore, Marietta watching wistfully as a silvery shoal of fish rounded the side of their boat. She squinted up at the angle of the sun and sighed.

“It’s a shame we haven’t the time to stop and fish a little. I’ve all our equipment beneath my seat but Aveline is bound to be expecting our timely arrival and I do try to impress her with my punctuality, if nothing else.”

She hunkered down next to Varric against the baseboard of the ship’s stern so she could trail her fingers in the water. “This Aveline...are you certain a guardsman won’t feel duty-bound to arrest someone like me?” Anders asked.

Hawke grinned. “Well, I’m still shackle-free, aren’t I? Aveline trusts me more than she fears disorder, and that’s really saying something. So long as she knows Auntie Hawke sent you, you’re golden.”

“Is it really that simple?”

Hawke’s spine straightened and she rose in her seat until her eyes were level with his downship. “You have made your character and abilities perfectly clear and I think we can forgive a spirit-based flareup in the face of Chantry atrocity. My healing magic’s paltry at best and with another mage at our side I needn’t resort to blood magic as frequently because we’ll have your spells to add to our attack pool.”

“And the rest of your fellows - they’re in agreement about this?”

“About that,” Carver grunted from the ship’s bow where he was carefully adjusting the sail. “You’re here because we can appreciate the presence of a healer and because the lot of us are thieves and criminals already. Just mind you keep a lid on...whatever it is you’re dealing with, and if you bring the templars down on my sister I’ll fork you over to the Circle myself.”

“Ah, sweet baby brother. What would I do without such thoughtful shows of concern?”

“In other words,” Varric managed to say from his precarious perch against the stern, face milk-white with sick, “we’re happy to have you along. Our merry band of misfits is your merry band of misfits.”

* * *

In due time, they made their way ashore, docking in the sort of hidden alcove lyrium smugglers would envy. The Wounded Coast was not so much a coast as a series of rocky outcroppings more or less associated with the distant Marcher shore, crags of sharp grey coated in a fine white sand that Anders knew, in compressed form, lined the streets of Kirkwall. Hundreds of years distant, this had been solid Imperial land, since sundered by time and magic and war. All that remained were crumbling Tevene ruins, dark whispers of demonic activity, and more Raider skulduggery than the City Guard cared to regulate.

Unless the guardsman in question were, it seemed, one Aveline Vallen.

She stood tall and red-haired and solid against the shifting sands and forbidding grey cliffs, one hand on her hip and the other on the hilt of her sword. Her armor glinted dully in the midday sun. Guard Captain Jevan was notoriously stingy with the arms and armor he had on offer, but hers were clearly well-cared for, if worn with nicks and a few dents too deep to bang out.

Hawke leapt from the stern and waded to shore before the ship had even properly docked to have a word with the guardsman, who frowned at her approach and motioned for the others to follow.

“...as I was saying, there might be some stragglers before the main group, but nothing we can’t handle. They’ll likely have trained assassins in their number, so look to the shadows - you and the apostate in particular ought to be on your guard, as they target mages first.”

“You know, _I’m_ an apostate too, Aveline.” Hawke replied. “And I’ve done my time in this city’s underworld. I know the hows and whys of who goes after mages and I imagine that the other apostate here - Anders by name, if it please you - knows as well.”

Aveline sighed deeply. “Yes, well, you and your friend know it all. I’ll say nothing further on the matter.”

“No friend of mine then, I take it, guardsman?” Anders asked, bristling at what he took to be her clear distaste for his kind.

“Please, everyone. We’ve only just met.” Hawke put a hand on Aveline’s shoulder. “You know me and trust me. I know him and trust him. I’m sure he’s willing to dispense with epithets if you are. We all have names here - let’s put them to good use, shall we?” She placed her other hand on Anders’ shoulder.

“Aveline, this is my friend Anders, a Spirit Healer with a good heart who will be of great use to us in combat. He’s another reason you needn’t watch my back so closely. And Anders, this is my comrade in arms and fellow Lothering refugee Aveline Vallen. Her steadfast courage has seen me through many dangers.”

The two of them regarded each other sullenly and Hawke clapped her hands together. “Well! There are mercenaries to kill, aren’t there? Now that we’re all on speaking terms with each other...”

* * *

They picked their way closer to the ambush site Aveline had scouted out. There was precious little cover aside from a few meager trees, so Hawke decided it was best to draw out the ambushers and take it from there, relying on improvisation as she too often did, if Carver had anything to say about it.

“Sister, I don’t care if we’re getting paid, I don’t care whose hide we’re saving - there’s no use in making money if we’re dead.” He scanned the hazy horizon and shifted uneasily where he stood, at the foot of a dune so high none of them could see beyond it, where Aveline told them the enemy lay in wait on the ledges that ringed a large depression in the dunes.

“Someone should tell Varric’s cousin Elmand.” Varric snorted.

“Maker’s balls, Etta, this is serious! We can’t keep pulling stunts like this!” Hawke tightened her leather cuffs to give her wrists the proper support while casting and heaved a sigh.

“Carver, do you really think Aveline Vallen, part-time Hawke family bodyguard, would lead us into real danger? She’s as battle-tested as you, if not more.” She leaned over to lift a rock the size of her fist from the scree at the base of the slope she’d just descended, rounding the corner to face him.

“And as reckless as you! What are you planning on doing - charging into the middle of that clearing? There are no chokepoints, no cover, nothing! Why do none of you people have any sense of self-preservation?”

Aveline rolled her eyes then fixed Carver with her steady gaze. “Your sister finds you honest work and still you balk. While I cannot say I like the idea of this Deep Roads expedition, I was under the impression you were dead set on it and buying into it will require a small fortune. Fortune favors the brave. Shoulder your blade and remember that you are done running from Ostagar. Now you have something to run _towards_.”

Hawke tossed the rock she was holding into the air above their heads and left it hanging there briefly before it slammed into pieces on the sand below as she made a sharp downward motion with her hand. Everyone looked at her, agape. “I’ve taken a few pages out of father’s book, quite literally. There are bits of his grimoire accessible to me now that I couldn’t read before because of his binding spells. He knew that once I was skilled enough to break them, I’d be prepared to learn whatever knowledge they might contain.”

Carver nudged the rock fragments with his foot. “What in the Maker’s name was that?”

“Force magic. Father rarely used it because it draws a great deal of attention, but it was a discipline in which he was well-versed, if his grimoire is any indication. Even now, what I know is enough to knock anyone who might approach us flat. And Anders here will pick up the slack with healing and ice magic, which Varric can take advantage of with his explosive quarrels taking out any Raiders frozen in place.”

A muscle jumped in Carver’s cheek as he clenched his jaw, but Hawke leaned up to ruffle his hair. “You asked for a fight this morning, remember? Trust me as you trusted Father all those years on the run. He was never one for elaborate plans but he always had an out - his magic, your martial talent, mother’s diplomacy. Bethany and I were his last resort. But Carver - this is _our_ last resort. It was easier when we were working for Athenril and we didn’t have any choice, but we have a choice now. Families face things together, and family is a thing you choose. And I choose this one.”

“Well, when you put it that way in front of everyone, what else can I rightly say without offending a guardsman, a businessman, and an abomination?” he grumbled.

“Sounds like a killer setup for a good joke, but let’s skip to the punchline, shall we? The part where I line them up, and you punch.”

* * *

 Hawke’s approach was simple - sprint to the center of the clearing, allow the oncoming Raiders to surround her, and slam them down with a move their father had (apparently unironically) dubbed “Fist of the Maker." Aveline was not far behind, bracing herself behind a worn Templar shield and carving an arc through the surrounding enemies with a handsome silverite blade that looked to be of Orlesian make. Prince brought up the rear with a relentless Mabari charge at his mistress' heels.

As fate and circumstance would have it, Anders found himself backed into a corner with Hawke’s temperamental brother. He’d stuck to the outside of the circle of Raiders, slipping healing and ice magic in through the press of armored bodies where it seemed prudent and trying to stay close to Varric in order to carry out their usual freeze and obliterate routine. When a rather large raider with a maul had charged him, however, this became impossible. Carver had broken away from his own charge of the assassin harrying his sister’s slow entropic spellcasting in order to aid him, much to his surprise.

The brute’s swings were wild and Carver would have had little trouble avoiding them, but connecting with them in order to knock back his opponent was another matter entirely. Anders was running low on magical energy and lyrium potions and wanted to save them for healing magic, so focused on simple attacks channelled from his staff from behind.

“Thanks for that, Carver! Appreciate it,” he yelled above the din and clangor of Hawke’s pyromancy and the clash of sword and shield.

Carver grunted in acknowledgment and took his own wild swing at the berserker’s head, finally hitting the man’s thick steel helm with a glancing blow that made his teeth grind.

“You know, mage,” he managed to say through the dizziness that overtook him after his desperate pirouette. “She doesn’t usually smile so easily.”

Anders flung up a brittle wall of ice but his spellpower was running low and the Raider easily crashed through it with all the momentum of Carver’s blow behind him.

“Shit...” He closed his eyes and tried to find his focus but thought better of it. There was no time for a proper attack without getting cold-clocked by the berserker. He shimmied up the side of a nearby outcropping and pulled himself onto a ledge above the battlefield, channelling all the spirit energy he could across the depression below, hoping it would invigorate Carver and replenish Aveline and Hawke’s dwindling reserves of strength. Varric was doing fine in the midst of a cloud of smoke and stunning powder.

“My sister is slow to trust,” Carver continued even as he leaned into another swing at the berserker. The man swayed where he stood.

“Can we maybe not do this now?” Anders swung his staff hand over hand, dispatching a group of men Hawke had infected with a spirit bomb with relatively little effort.

“Even slower to smile,” Carver went on. He knocked the man to his knees with the pommel of his warhammer. “If you have her trust, you have it completely.” Anders chanced an ice spell and froze what remained of the man’s flagging life force. Carver turned his face up to look Anders in the eye where he stood above the field of battle. “See that you don’t abuse it.”

Anders frowned. “You know that little speech of your sister’s was about trusting people in general, not about trust without reservation. And not about me, specifically. I doubt it was meant to imply that she trusts me unreservedly, sewer-dwelling magical disaster that I am.”

“You ran from the Circle and the Wardens. See that you don’t run from her, if she has need of you. If I know anything about her blasted penchant for self-sacrifice, she will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Waffles" is the nickname Varric gives a diplomatic/blue Hawke when they ask Varric for one during a banter in the Mark of the Assassin DLC. 
> 
> And Varric's cousin Elmand is referenced in a banter between Varric and Aveline in Act 2 - he's an imaginary cousin that Varric has registered as head of various Tethras family business.


End file.
